


SPN Fic: Kingdom of Days

by dotfic



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-10
Updated: 2010-07-10
Packaged: 2017-10-14 13:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/149722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dotfic/pseuds/dotfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean had no idea how this happened, how he had this, all of this -- all of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	SPN Fic: Kingdom of Days

**Author's Note:**

> a/n: Originally posted at the spn_foxhole Team Free Will schmoop meme, for klutzy_girl's prompt "family dinner night," tweaked and polished since then.

There was an infestation of goblins down near Clarksville.

"Goblins, Dean." The relief was a bright thread in Sam's voice over the phone. He almost sounded excited about it.

Dean wanted to get there with him and couldn't, although the thought of torching a nest of evil critters might have made his heart rate go up a little.

The FUBARed mess of a power vacuum Lucifer had left behind him wasn't confined to Hell and Heaven. Dean knew exactly how Sam felt. He was sick of fighting demons and angels.

"I can head over to Lisa's now," Sam said. "How soon can you leave?"

Across the kitchen, Lisa looked up from helping Ben with his homework. _Goblins,_ Dean mouthed at her, and she gave him her wry, resigned lopsided smile.

"Let's go torch some goblins," Dean said.

*

They kept most of their gear at Sam's apartment, although Dean had shotgun, his handgun, and ammo in a lockbox on the top shelf of Lisa's bedroom closet. While Sam loaded their gear into the Impala , Lisa snagged the collar of Dean's jacket as he moved by her on the porch.

"Hey," she said, her fingers playing with the worn leather. "When you guys get back, we should have everyone over for dinner."

"Everyone? What's the occasion?"

"Nothing. Just dinner," she said, and he heard the amusement in her voice, as if she thought it was funny he couldn't grasp the concept of dinner-just-because.

They hadn't done any holidays except July 4th, and Dean would rather not think about that. Sam had still been gone on July 4th but he'd soldiered through it for Ben, for Sam. Maybe for Lisa, so she wouldn't get that worried crease between her eyes over him.

"Call Bobby, tell him he should invite his weird friend Rufus, too. And invite Castiel if he's uh, on the planet." She grinned, then leaned in to give him a quick kiss and murmured, "Stay safe."

Lisa went back inside, her palm brushing over her son's head as she passed him. Ben hovered in the doorway.

"See you in a day or two, kiddo," Dean said.

Ben nodded and gave Dean a level stare. Dean got the message clear enough: if Dean got hurt or didn't come back, Ben would hate him forever.

Dean sometimes wondered what the hell he was doing.

*

The goblins didn't put up much of a fight. Or maybe he and Sam had gone up against enough big, weird shit that the small shit didn't seem so difficult anymore, which was a dangerous way of thinking.

*

He and Sam cooked, Dean slicing potatoes and carrots and Sam in charge of the steaks. They worked without saying much, in a hard-earned, easy quiet. Dean handed Sam the salt before he asked for it, while the meat sizzled, drops of oil dancing up like tiny fireworks in the pan.

It was six months since Sam had come back and a month or two now where the awkwardness had eased. The cooking was like the goblin hunt, where they knew what the other one needed him to do, where they fit.

Sam pushed his hair back from his eyes with the edge of his sleeve and then paused, holding the spatula. "What?"

Dean kept his eyes on the potatoes as he kept on slicing, fast and neat. "Nothing." He still wondered sometimes how his little brother had gotten so broad and solid and how his face had gotten a little too old for a guy not yet thirty -- but only sometimes, because Dean knew. "It's...uh." He finished cutting the potato, and there was nothing left to cut. He shrugged. "I'm glad you're here."

There was a long silence, while the sizzling of the meat grew ridiculously loud.

"Yeah. Me too," said Sam.

*

Rufus and Bobby were arguing, something about a hunt back in '97, while Lisa watched the debate like it was a tennis match and Sam hovered over his steaks in the kitchen. Leaning forward, Bobby jabbed his hand at the air to make a point as Rufus started laughing, shaking his head, which only seemed to annoy Bobby further. He settled back in his wheelchair, fingers drumming on the arm. Bobby seemed more comfortable in the chair this time around, although the frustration was still a constant layer, giving Bobby's caustic remarks an extra edge these days.

Bobby most likely didn't see it that way, but Dean thought Bobby in the chair was a small price to pay for Bobby's soul back where it ought to be.

Leaning against the doorframe between the living room and the dining room, he turned to watch Ben set the table.

The kid worked with deliberation, neatly arranging the napkins and the cutlery, adjusting a glass he felt was out of place.

"So then I told Steve that if he didn't give me back my DVD I was going tell the whole school about the time he cried while we were watching _Bambi_."

"Dude, _Bambi_ is really depressing."

"I know but Steve is such a jerk, he's been taking a lot of kid's stuff." Ben talked with rapid-fire speed, while he kept on his slow careful work with the table. "I told him he'd better give Jill back her Megatron -- it was a real expensive one, the Transformers Leader, her dad got it for her birthday -- and give Aaron back his iphone. Who knows what else this guy lifted. He's a pain in my butt."

"Don't say _butt_ ," Dean said, automatic, because Lisa would've said it.

"Fine, in my behind." He glanced up at Dean, eyebrows going up. "You say _butt_ all the time, and worse."

"Yes, but I'm a grownup. Grownups can do that. Kids can't."

The ruffle of wind behind him was cool against the back of Dean's neck. "Hi, Cas," Dean said, without turning around.

"Hello, Dean," Castiel said, stepping up beside him in the doorway. He wore jeans and a white button-down shirt, finally gave up on the suit and trenchcoat right around the time Sam came back. "I don't understand why you have one standard of language for adults and one for children. Ben knows what the word means."

"Yeah, well, because...that's how it works, okay?"

"Why does it work that way?" Castiel said, sounding, for a moment, like Ben protesting some unfairness.

"Yeah." Ben stopped setting the table and folded his arms, so Dean had Ben and Castiel staring at him, demanding an explanation.

"Don't look at me, I didn't make the rules."

Ben rolled his eyes.

*

Dean couldn't remember the last time he'd sat at a table with this many people where it wasn't a council of war.

The sky smudged from red to black outside the windows, Lisa had lit candles, and the food smelled great. Castiel and Sam sat opposite Dean, deep in some conversation about an ancient text that Sam said no one could prove was authentic (and Castiel drily said he'd vouch it for because he'd actually _been_ there). Ben got Bobby to laugh, and even Rufus's face softened and relaxed. He ate his steak like a guy who thought there might be more someday, relishing it, not like someone expecting the world to end at any second.

Dean had no idea how this happened, how he had this, all of this -- all of them. His chest grew a little tight, watching Sam jab his fork into a piece of potato to emphasize one of his points. When he'd first come back, with this strange residual energy caught in him, a leftover present from Lucifer, Sam had made a remark about being a freak as usual and Dean had almost shoved him through a wall, he'd lost it. Yelled that Sam didn't _get it_ , he'd been lost and now he wasn't and he was still Sam and Sam could shut his cakehole and stop calling himself a freak.

It was hard to breathe. Dean grabbed his glass of wine and took a few swallows, let the warmth spread down into him.

Lisa's fingers brushed Dean's under the table. He caught them and held on.

Towards the end of the meal, Bobby asked to give a toast.

"To absent friends."

 

*

Castiel's shoulder was about brushing his as they stood on the porch, and Dean felt the familiar, slightly elevated level of heat off him. Jimmy had long since gone home to his family, and Castiel's copied body always seemed both more human and more alien at the same time. He'd never asked what happened to that body while Castiel was in heaven, but then there were so many illogical things about Cas that Dean had learned to stop trying to figure it all out.

Dean decided he'd better stop thinking about Castiel's body -- that was long behind them. He inhaled slowly, pushing off the sudden hollow ache in his belly. Whatever they were now, Castiel kept coming back, that's what mattered. Like Sam had come back. They'd all fought so many battles together by now that he couldn't keep track of them, blended in his memory. Castiel still insisted he was the one who'd saved Sam and Dean's ass in Phoenix, although Dean was sure it was the other way around.

Sitting on the top step, Sam drank his beer slowly. A firefly landed on his sleeve and he let it sit there, blinking its soft glow. Dean came over to sit next to him, and Castiel settled on his other side. He was drinking too, although Dean knew it was mere politeness -- his way of showing he was happy to be among them, since it would take an entire delivery truck of beer for him to get much of a buzz.

"How are things upstairs?" Sam asked, his gaze sliding towards the sky.

"Quiet, for now." Castiel looked grim, and took another swallow, as if he could feel the effects of the beer after all. Dean wondered if maybe he could.

From inside, they heard the sound of a studio fanfare logo on the TV -- someone must've put in a movie.

Dean lifted his beer bottle. "To freedom and peace," he said, and clanked his bottle against Sam's, then Castiel's.

Sam's face opened into a wide smile, so deep the dimples formed in his cheeks -- it had been a long time since he'd seen Sam smile like that. On his other side, Castiel gave a smaller, quieter smile of his own.

"Amen," said Castiel.


End file.
